


Henry's Mothers

by justanoutlaw



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-12
Updated: 2016-10-12
Packaged: 2018-08-22 00:38:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8266295
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justanoutlaw/pseuds/justanoutlaw
Summary: Season 6. Henry knows they have to defeat the Evil Queen to get everyone their happy endings. That doesn't mean it's easy to admit he has to take down his third mother. Can Emma and Regina understand?





	

A normal day, it’s all Henry wanted. He hadn’t had any of that, ever. Sure, he had fake memories of himself with Emma in New York, but after he got his real ones back, they all got foggy. With all going on, he just wanted one normal day. So, he told both his mothers he was going to spend some time with Violet and headed to pick her up. He decided to take her to his castle, a place he hadn’t been to in a very long time.

“So this is your castle,” Violet said as they sat in it together. He had gotten takeout from Granny’s, so it was more like a picnic.  
“It is. Nothing like the ones in Camelot, I’m sure.”  
“Definitely not, but it’s charming.” She smiled at him.  
“I brought my iPod and speakers,” Henry said, holding them up. “What do you want to listen to?”  
“Whatever you want to. I’m just glad I get to see you! You’ve been so busy lately.”  
“I’ve been trying to help my mom sort out all the new people from the Land of Untold Stories,” he explained.  
“Well you are the savior’s son after all.” 

Henry smiled and turned on some Coldplay. The two sat, eating and listening, while also chatting about mindless things, like Violet and her father settling down in this new world. 

“I still can’t believe what television is like! It’s as if you’re watching a show, but you can pause and record it,” Violet said in amazement.  
Henry laughed. Sometimes he forgot just how fascinating things could be to outsiders. “You’re cute when you talk like that.”  
The girl blushed. “Really?”  
“Yeah.”

She leaned into kiss him and he braced himself, when out of the corner of his eye, he saw a cloud of purple smoke.

“What is going on here?”

Violet pulled away from Henry, looking confused.

“Miss Mills?” She asked.  
The Evil Queen laughed. “Oh no, I’m not Miss Mills. Henry, who’s your friend?”  
“Go away,” was all he could manage to muster.  
“Who is this, Henry?” Violet asked, feeling scared. Henry took her hand.  
“It’s what I was telling you about, my mother separated herself from the evil in her, but she’s still around,” he explained, keeping his eyes on his girlfriend and her alone.  
“Oh. So she’s not your mother?”  
“Of course I am. And as I asked,” the Evil Queen sauntered forward with regal and grace. “Who. Are. You?” She pointed a long finger and poked the girl in the chest, glaring at her. Henry pushed her hand away.  
“Her name is Violet,” he said.  
“And why was she about to kiss you? Henry don’t you know you’re too young for that.” She knew exactly who Violet was, she was just trying to get under his skin.  
“I am a teenager,” Henry reminded her.  
“No girl is good enough for you, you are a very special prince, Henry.” The tall woman grabbed his face. “Don’t you know where you belong?”

Henry stared deep into her eyes. They were the same eyes that had tried to keep him hers and only hers for years. And a part of him understood why. She had always been alone and she didn’t want to be that way again. So she manipulated him, made everyone think he was crazy. She had even tried to keep him a prisoner by magic in their home. 

“Don’t listen to her, Violet,” Henry whispered. “You should go.”  
“But Henry…” Violet looked worried, she didn’t want him to be hurt.  
“She’s not going to hurt me. Right…Mom?” Henry asked, praying that acknowledging her as such would make the queen let go of him.  
“Why would I hurt my son?” She moved her free hand towards Violet. “Be gone.” And in a puff of smoke, the girl was gone.  
“Where did you send her?!?” He asked, panicked.  
“Relax, sweetie. She’ll be just fine.” The Evil Queen finally let him go and he rubbed his cheeks, trying to rid himself of the pain. “Now come with me.”  
“I’m not going anywhere with you!” Henry protested.  
“I am your mother.”  
“You may be a version of my mother, but I want nothing to do with you!”  
“Oh, so you just want to throw away the woman who cared for you all those years? The one who nursed you when you were sick, picked you up when you fell, fed you, clothed you…”  
“You may have been there, but that was the good shining through, not the bad!”  
“And how would you know, you’re ordinary Henry,” Evil Queen replied with a smirk. “Without me, you’re nothing. I can protect you.”  
“You’re not the only one who can.”  
“Oh and that woman who abandoned you does? Where is she now? Where’s Regina? If I were them, I wouldn’t have let you out of my sight.”  
“And we didn’t!”

Evil Queen whipped around to find Emma and Regina standing there. 

“Henry, are you okay?” The brunette asked, racing past her evil self to get to her son.  
“I’m fine.” He looked between his three mothers, feeling very overwhelmed.  
“I had a bad feeling something was going to happen, so we decided to come here,” Emma explained. She walked up to the Evil Queen who was still smirking.  
“Oh and you two care so much about him, huh?” She asked sarcastically. “You’re always so busy saving the world, you’re never there for him.”  
“That is not true!”  
“And didn’t you rip out that poor girl’s heart, just to break Henry’s?”  
“I made a mistake,” Emma tried to say.  
“And you.” She turned to face Regina. “You’re not even a real mother. He has to comfort you every time you fall from grace. You can’t protect yourself, let alone our son.”  
“That’s not true!” Henry yelled, jumping down. “They do protect me! Just because I help them, doesn’t mean anything.”  
“But doesn’t it? They don’t love you, Henry. They can’t even love themselves.”  
“They do love me,” Henry told her, narrowing his eyes. “And I know that you love me too.”  
Evil Queen smiled. “So long as we have one thing straight.”  
“You just don’t know how. You always tried to use your power to make me feel safe, but all I ever did was feel scared. You shouldn’t have to be afraid of the person you love!”  
“You’re being ungrateful, Henry,” she warned.  
“I don’t care.”  
“Let’s just get out of here,” Emma said. Her hand was shaky for a few minutes, but eventually, she was able to use it to poof herself, Regina and Henry back to the house she shared with Killian.  
“Are you really okay?” Regina asked, pulling her son into her arms.  
Henry bit his lip. “I need to be alone.”  
“Henry.”  
“Please, Mom.”

And with that, he headed up to the room Emma had set up for him. He threw himself, face down onto the bed, his head swimming.

The queen had been right. She was his mother and she had been there for him. Even with the good, there was that bad part of her that still loved him. But like he had said, she would never know how to really love him. She would never put him before anything, all she would see is her desire to “protect him” from things he didn’t need to be protected from.

There was a soft knock on the door.

“Henry?” It was Emma. “Can I come in?”  
“I want to be alone.”  
“Please, Henry.”  
He sighed. “Fine.”

The door opened and both women walked in, sitting on either side of him on the bed.

“What she said, it wasn’t true,” Emma said “She’s just trying to tear us apart.”  
“I know that,” Henry mumbled.  
“Then what’s the matter?”  
“It’s because I love her!” Henry exclaimed, sitting up. “And I hate that I do.”  
Regina sighed. “Oh, Henry.”  
“I love you Mom, I do. And I’m glad you’re not that person anymore but…she is right. For the first decade of my life, that’s who raised me. She’s the one that was there. And I loved her, even though she was terrible to me at times, I love her. And now, we’re trying to defeat her and it’s killing me!”

Regina wrapped her arms around her son, rubbing his back. 

“Shhh, it’s okay honey, it’s okay,” she whispered.  
“How is it okay? This is the one villain I don’t want to help you defeat?” He whispered back.  
“Because, I understand. It was a lot on me to give up that part of me, losing a part of yourself is never easy.”  
“I didn’t want to give up the darkness, remember,” Emma added.  
“That’s different,” Henry said, his voice muffled in Regina’s chest.  
The blonde placed a hand on his back. “It’s not.”  
“It’s okay to love her and me,” Regina added. “It doesn’t mean you love me any less.”

He drew back a deep breath and slowly nodded.

“We have to defeat her, there’s no way around it, but we’re going to help you through this, I promise.”  
“You both are busy…”  
Emma cut him off. “You’re our son, Henry. We’re not going to let you down again.” She placed her hand on top of his.  
Regina nodded, placing hers on top of Emma’s. “We promise.”

**Author's Note:**

> Really short, I may add to it as the season progresses and we find out how they’ll end this arc! Don’t forget to review!


End file.
